'Avengers: Infinity War' Has The Biggest Opening Weekend Of All Time Worldwide, Has Already Outgrossed 6 MCU Movies
Earth's Mightiest Heroes just became a whole lot mightier — at the box office. Avengers: Infinity War has officially broken the all-time opening weekend record, edging out the previous worldwide title holder, The Fate of the Furious, for the highest-grossing box office opening in cinema history. And it hasn't even come out in China yet.
Avengers: Infinity War has already won the battle at the box office, raking in $630 million worldwide. This debut smashes all previous records for opening weekend box office, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Domestically, Infinity War is nothing to sneeze at either. The Marvel Studios film opened to a record-setting $258 million in North America, edging out Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($248 million) as the biggest opening in domestic history. And it easily outshot The Fate of the Furious' previous record-holding $541.9 million worldwide.
But one surprising outcome of this record-shattering opening: in just its opening weekend, Avengers: Infinity War has already outgrossed six Marvel Cinematic Universe films.
According to Box Office Mojo (via ScreenRant), Infinity War's $258 million debut has already surpassed the total domestic grosses for The Incredible Hulk, Captain America: The First Avenger, Ant-Man, Thor, Thor: The Dark World and Doctor Strange. It was just shy of Captain America: The Winter Soldier's $259 million, but as Monday's numbers come in, we can expect the second Captain America to be added to the list as well.
With the double whammy of Infinity War and the cultural phenomenon that is Black Panther, which still holds the record for highest-grossing superhero movie of all time in North America, Marvel is having a pretty great year.
As the culmination of 10 years of superhero storytelling, the hype was astronomical for Avengers: Infinity War. Featuring a surplus of 70 characters, countless action set-pieces, and even more witty one-liners, it seemed like a no-brainer that Infinity War would become the biggest blockbuster of the summer, before the summer movie season even started. There's a reason all of the /Filmcast and /Film put it as their No. 1 choice for winner of the summer box office.
But let's also talk about how amazing Infinity War's achievement really is. The anticipation — and brand loyalty — has been building for years, but it's all the more impressive when you realize that Infinity War is a bold creative experiment 10 years in the making. You need to know the characters going in, and you need to have seen at least half of the 18 previous movies. It's a lot to ask of audiences, but Marvel did, and fans leapt to the challenge.
So I guess we'll see you next week when Infinity War opens in China on May 11. I bet that we'll have a slew of new records shattered with a snap of the fingers.